that night clare died.
peter slept always now in the sitting-room with the door open lest she should need anything. he was tired that night, exhausted with struggles of conscience, battles of the flesh, forebodings of the future; he slept heavily without dreams. when at seven in the morning he came to see whether she were awake, he found her, staring ironically in front of her, dead.
heart-failure the doctor afterwards said. he had told peter days before that veronal and other things were old friends of hers. to-day no sign of them. nevertheless . . . had she assisted herself a little along the inevitable road? before he left on the evening before she had talked to him. he was often afterwards to see her, sitting up on the sofa, her yellow hair piled untidily on her head, her face like the mask of a tired child, her eyes angry as always.
"well, peter," she had said, "so you're in love with that girl?"
he admitted it at once, standing stolidly in front of her, looking at her with that pity in his eyes that irritated her so desperately.
"yes, i love her," he said, "but she doesn't love me. when you're better we'll go away and live somewhere else. paris if you like. we'll make a better thing of it, clare, than we did the first time."
"very magnanimous," she answered him. "but don't be too sure that she doesn't love you. or she will when she's recovered from this present little affair. you must marry her, peter—and if you do you'll make a success of it. she's the honestest woman i've met yet and you're the honestest man i know. you'll suit one another. . . . mind you, i don't mean that as a compliment. people as honest as you two are tiresome for[pg 318] ordinary folks to live with. i found you tiresome twenty years ago, peter, i find you tiresome still."
he suddenly came down and knelt beside her sofa putting his arm round her. "clare, please, please don't talk like that. my life's with you now. i daresay you find me dull. i am dull i know. but i'm old enough to understand now that you must have your freedom. all that i care about is for you to get well; then you shall do as you like. i won't tie you in any way; only be there if you want a friend."
she suddenly put up her hand and stroked his cheek, then as suddenly withdrew her hand and tucked it under her.
"poor peter," she said. "it was bad luck my coming back like that just when she'd broken with her young man. never mind. i'll see what i can do. i did you a bad turn once—it would be nice and christian of me to do you a good turn now. we ought never to have married of course—but you would marry me, you know."
she looked at him curiously, as though she were seeing him for the first time.
"what do you think about life, peter? what does it mean to you, all this fuss and agitation?"
"mean?" he repeated. "oh, i don't know."
"yes, you do," she answered him. "i know exactly what you think. you think it's for us all to get better in. to learn from experience, a kind of boarding-school before the next world."
"well, i suppose i do think it's something of that sort," he answered. "it hasn't any meaning for me otherwise. it feels like a fight and a fight about something real."
"and what about the people who get worse instead of better? it's rather hard luck on them. it isn't their fault half the time."
"we don't see the thing as it really is, i expect," he answered her, "nor people as they really are."
she moved restlessly.
"now we're getting preachy. i expect you get preachy rather easily just as you used to. all i know is that i'm tired—tired to death. do you remember how frightened i used to be twenty years ago? well, i'm not frightened any longer. there's[pg 319] nothing left to be frightened of. nothing could be worse than what i've had already. but i'm tired—damnably, damnably tired. and now i think i'll just turn over and go to sleep if you'll leave me for a bit."
he kissed her and left her, and at some moment between then and the morning she left him.
